Making Policy Work

About this course

Policy-makers
face day-to-day choices about how to achieve their objectives. They need to
know about how to use the resources under their command to get the best
results. This course is about how best policy-makers can use these tools of
government and what evidence there is about what works most effectively.
Methods of evaluating policy effectiveness are covered, with a focus on the use
of experiments, such as randomized controlled trials. Different tools of
government, like regulation and finance, are considered. There is a focus on
practical examples, such as policies on the use of illegal drugs, local
economic development and performance management. The final part of the course
examines behavioral economics or the ‘nudge’ policy agenda, which is currently
often used by governments across the world to improve public policy.